RICHMOND, Va. (AP) - A school board is studying whether to rename a Henrico middle school named after one of the architects of a set of policies that aggressively pushed back against court-ordered integration of public schools in the 1950s and 1960s.
The Washington Post reports that the Henrico County school board on Thursday directed Superintendent Patrick C. Kinlaw to study the financial impact of changing the name of Harry F. Byrd Middle School after several people spoke in favor of the change.
Byrd, a former state senator and governor, signed on to the Southern Manifesto opposing the U.S. Supreme Court's Brown v. Board of Education ruling that struck down school segregation. Byrd later spearheaded the Massive Resistance movement, a term that included legal maneuvering to prevent black children from entering white schools.